ollowing on the last post with Ms Furno's students and their/our first Minecraft.edu experience... Highs? Student engagement, collaboration, working with tools that will benefit them in the long run... Lows? Laptops that wouldn't hold a charge... hmmm - I believe that's it and so I will say day 1 was a success! Yesterday though was our first day in the Urban World. Poor 3rd period, (they have encore first 2 periods) they were such the guinea pigs - we just turned them loose after introductions and said "work together" - "do it".. 4th and on we began to assign jobs - housebuilders, canal builders, treasure hunters, gatherers, tool builders. We divided the class into to groups. When they logged in they put a G1 or G2 after their names so they could see who was in their group. Mike, (UNCG) was awesome! Very grateful for his ability to spend time on campus and lead us in this endeavor.
Next day, we assigned groups to work together on Rounds 2-3-4-5. It's hard to balance curriculum and play. Divvying up the other 4 rounds and having Ms Furno talk about each Round as they were assigned helped tie in curriculum. She's going to follow up on Friday with a full discussion of the application - and perhaps she will complete the assignment via paper/marker. Mr. Hill is going to wait until after the New Year. Andy, District Supervisor is coming in to see - it's exactly what we want - for Downtown to see how we can engage and cultivate independent learning. No doubt Minecraft.edu is engaging, but for curricular purposes? Flying and creative mode where the students had all the resources was very helpful.
Next day, we assigned groups to work together on Rounds 2-3-4-5. It's hard to balance curriculum and play. Divvying up the other 4 rounds and having Ms Furno talk about each Round as they were assigned helped tie in curriculum. She's going to follow up on Friday with a full discussion of the application - and perhaps she will complete the assignment via paper/marker. Mr. Hill is going to wait until after the New Year. Andy, District Supervisor is coming in to see - it's exactly what we want - for Downtown to see how we can engage and cultivate independent learning. No doubt Minecraft.edu is engaging, but for curricular purposes? Flying and creative mode where the students had all the resources was very helpful.